RATOC Systems Intros USB 3.0 RAID Box

Japanese company RATOC Systems introduced a trio of products that lets users expand their data storage once they run out of drive bays and ports in their case. The first one is the RS-EC32PE-U3R, a bundle consisting of a 2-bay USB 3.0 to SATA 3 Gb/s RAID enclosure and a PCIe USB 3.0 addon card; the RS-EC32EX-U3R, which is a bundle including the same 2-bay RAID enclosure, but including a 2-port USB 3.0 expansion card in the ExpressCard34 form-factor; and REX-PEU3X, which is a standalone 2-port USB 3.0 expansion card in the PCIe form-factor.

The expansion cards in these bundles are based on new Renesas μPD720202 chipset. The RAID enclosure has two 3.5-inch SATA drive bays. Its controller provides a maximum data transfer performance of 372 MB/s. It supports disk organization modes of "single" (just a single disk connected), RAID JBOD, RAID 0, and RAID 1. Expected to launch mid-March, the RATOC RS-EC32PE-U3R and RS-EC32EX-U3R are priced at 11,130 JPY (US $138), the REX-PEU3X goes for 3,360 JPY (US $41.7).